“How do you feel about slavery?” the defendant asked the potential juror.
The potential juror clutched her purse tighter. “Historically?” she asked. “Or modern?”
“It’s a broad question,” responded the defendant, who was representing himself. “However you want to respond.”
“Historically, it’s wrong,” the potential juror said, her eyes darting to the courtroom door. “Today, it’s wrong.”
*Thanks to Evan Karp and Rajshree Chuahan for hosting the first night of the Quiet Lightning reading series, and for including me in the party.
“She scares me,” said the little boy peering up at the Richard Avedon photo of Björk. Then he turned and looked around the entire room of portraits. “These people just don’t smile.”
“I want to watch this movie sometime, but I can’t remember what it is.” The man at the bar gestured up at the silent television overhead. “It’s weird. About robots.”
“Transformers?” asked the girl, though what was on the screen was animated.
“No,” he said. “It’s some weird Pixar-type thing.”
“You mentioned you were a magician,” said the defendant, who was representing himself.
“No, musician,” said the potential juror. “If I was a magician, I’d disappear right now.”
“Can you take me with you?” asked the judge.
“Snorkeling,” he said.
“Snorkeling?” she said.
“Come on,” he said. “You still have to hold your fucking breath.”
“Where’s your shoes, sister? You’re going to get gangrene on your feet.”
“Don’t even start with me,” the old woman groused. “I don’t want to get upset.”
“I’m just looking out for you, sister,” he said.
“I don’t have no money for the hormone pills,” she said, pushing her shopping cart back and forth from her spot on the bus shelter bench. “I don’t want to wear my shoes because I’m too hot because I don’t have my hormone pills.”
He stopped chiding her then. He just nodded in time with the rocking of the cart.
